St. Landry democrat., 1887-07-30

THE HAMpToNs, July 24.-The Rev. T.
Dewitt Talmage's subject this morning
was: "Preaching, Teaching and Exhor-
tation," and his text-Romans, 10; 18th
and 9Th verses: COR ministry, let us wait
on our ministering; OF he that teacheth,
on teaching; or he that exhorteth, on ex-
hortation."
Before the world is converted the style
of religious discourse will have to be con-
verted. You might as we'll go into the
modern Sedan or Gettysburg with bows
and arrows instead of rifles and bomb
shells and parks of artillery, as to expect
to conquer this world for God by the old
STYLE of exhortation and sermonology.
Jonathan Edwards preached the sermons
most adapted to the age in which he
lived; but if those sermons were preached
now they would divide an audience into
two classes, those sound asleep and those
wanting to 60 home.
But there is religious discourse of the
future-who will preach it l have no
idea, in what part of the earth it will be
born I have no idea, in which denomina-
tons of Christians it will be delivered I
cannot guess That discourse or exhor-
tation may be born in the country meet
ing-house on the banks of the St. Law
renee, or the Oregon, or the Ohio, or the
Tombigbee, Or the Alabama. The person
who shall deliver it may this moment be
in a cradle under the shadow of the Sierra
Nevadas, or in New England farm
house, or amid the rice fields of Southern
savannas. Or this moment there may be
some young man in some of our
theological seminaries, in the junior
or middle or senior class, shaping
that weapon of power. Or there may
be coming some new baptism of the
Holy Ghost on the churches, so that
some of US who now stand in the watch
towers of Zion, waking to a realization
of our present inefficiency, may preach
it ourselves. That coming discourse
may not be fifty years off. And let us
pray God that its arrival may be hast
ened, while | announce to you what l
think will be the chief characteristics of
that discourse or exhortation when it
does arrive, and | want to make the re-
marks of the morning appropriate and
suggestive to all classes of Christian
workers.
First of all I remark, that that future
religious discourse will be full of living
Christ in contradistinction to didactic
technicalities A discourse may be full
of Christ though hardly mentioning His
name, and sermon may be empty of
Christ while every sentence is repeti-
tious of His. titles. The world wants a
living Christ, not Christ standing at
the head of formal system of theology,
but Christ who means pardon and
sympathy, and coincidence, and brother
hood, and life, and Heaven. A poor
mans Christ. A rich mans Christ. An
overworked mans Christ An invalid
Christ. A farmers Christ. A mer-
chants Christ. An artisans Christ.
An every mans Christ.
A symmetrical and fine-wor led sys-
tenn of theology is well enough for the
illogical classes, but it has no more bust
ness in pulpit than have the technical
phrases of an anatomist or psychologist
or physician in the sick room of pa
tient. The world wants help, immediate
and world uplifting, and it will come
through a discourse in which Christ
shall walk right down into the immortal
soul and take everlasting possession of
it, filling it as full of light as is this
MONDAY armament. ..
That sermon or exhortation of the fu-
ture will not deal with men in the thread
bare illustrations of Jesus Christ. In that
coming address there will be instances of
vicarious suffering taken right out of
everyday life, for there is not day some
body is not dying for others. AS the
physician saving his diptheritic patient
by sacrificing his own life; as the ship
captain going down with his vessel, while
he is getting his passengers into the life
boat; as the fireman consuming in the
burning building while he is taking
child out of fourth-story window; as
in summer the strong swimmer at East
Hampton, or Long Branch, or Cape
May, or Lake George, himself persisted
trying to rescue the drowning as the
newspaper boy one summer, supporting
his mother for some years-his invalid
mother-when offered by gentleman
fifty cents to get some especial paper,
and he got it, and rushed up in his
anxiety to deliver it, and was crushed
under the wheels of the train, and lay
on the grass with only strength enough
to say: "Oh, what will become of my
poor sick mother now?"
Vicarious suffering The world is full
of it. An engineer said to me on To-
connective in Dakota: "We men seem to
be coming to better appreciation than we
used to. Did you see that account the
other day of an engineer who, to save
his passengers, stuck to his place, and
when he was found dead in the locomo-
tive, which was upside down, he was
found stiH smiling, his hand on the air
brake ?" And as the engineer said it to
me he put his hand on the air-brake to
illustrate his meaning, and / looked at
him and thought: "You would be just
as much of hero in the same crisis"
Oh, in that religious discourse of the
future there will be living illustrations
taken out from everyday life of vicarious
suffering illustrations that will bring to
mind the ghastlier sacrifice of Him, who,
in the high place of the field on thAcross,
fought our battles, and wept our griefs,
and ended our struggle, and died our
death
A German sculptor made an image of
Christ, and he asked his little child two
wears old who it was, and she said
stThat must be some very great man."